D&D 5E Megadungeon delving as a campaign’s core; is it compatible with modern play?

[WarDriveWorley]

Dungeon of the Mad Mage has factions and story going on with its levels, and I'd count that as a Mega Dungeon. I think Mega Dungeons absolutely work with modern play, but as Snarf said, you might have to tinker with things if the party will be unable to freely leave and come back.

Absolutely, which is what I ended up doing. Always been an ardent believer that dungeons should have some sort of explainable ecology even if the explanation is magic and given a large enough dungeon it makes sense to have factions, neutral npcs, and the like.

 

[Sacrosanct]

Absolutely, which is what I ended up doing. Always been an ardent believer that dungeons should have some sort of explainable ecology even if the explanation is magic and given a large enough dungeon it makes sense to have factions, neutral npcs, and the like.

Absolutely. When I did Felk Mor, there needed to be an ecology and factions there. With a megadungeon that takes up weeks or months of game play, PCs need to have a base of operations. And having several factions where the PCs have a choice of who to ally with is important, IMO. It's a great place to resupply, find new allies (if PCs die), etc.

 

[LordEntrails]

This threads shows the problems with labels, such as old school, new school, narration driven play etc. Any 2 people can agree on a definition, but once you add a third person to the discussion...

Anyway, yes you can run a megadungeon in 5E. Without tweaking rules. Many of us have done or are doing it.

Can you expand on that? I really don't think the PC-as-superhero, mechanically-anemic exploration pillar playstyle in WotC 5e is compatible with megadungeon play without some adjustments.

Labels... Cant say what you mean by those labels, but I would certainly never come close to describing a 5E character that way.

A couple things to keep in mind when approaching a mega dungeon campaign: sure, you can run it like I did when I was 8 and it's just ick in the door kill what's there. Or you can set it up as a living environment. Like DoMM tries to do or I did with my own version of Undermountain. Is it a dynamic environment, or is it static? Doesn't matter if you are running DoMM or LMoP, if you make the setting alive, then it's alive. Do things have reasons for being here and acting that way, or are they just fights to overcome?

Now, for all this rule tweaking debate. If you want supplies and long rests to be in limited supply, then make them so. There is always a reasonable in-game counter for anything that would say otherwise. (Wandering monsters, cursed zone, wild magic, etc). Worried about the magic hut? Make the inhabitants smart enough to learn (hence they have survived adventurers before). And remember, turn about is fair play. Don't limit yourself, and don't limit your players.

 

[J-H]

I did Castlevania (Castle Dracula on DM guild because I don't want to get sued) as a megadungeon of sorts... Levels 3-13, no exiting/buying supplies, but plenty of exploration.
There were a few linear bits, but also some times when the players could choose their route, move back and forth between areas IF they figured out or discovered secret passages, etc. The magic mirror to the library requiring a book in their possession stumped them for a long time.

Each area had its own set of native creatures/monsters and differing layout, so the experience in the library vs. the treasury vs. the dungeon was always very different.
A megadungeon HAS to have some sort of ecology or differentiation between areas, so that the play experience doesn't stay the same for more than 2 sessions.

Character discussion and development came from within the party, as well as with interaction from various NPCs who had varying degrees of hostility and ability to work with the party (Werewolf lord wanted a duel, Medusa wanted to eat them, the Lich librarian wanted them to not annoy him or break things, etc.). It was about 20-25 sessions long. Everyone had fun.

 

[jgsugden]

The answer is yes you can, but you might want to shift the focus of the discussion into how you can do it.

I think one option is what Matt Mercer did on Critical Role - make it optional. In Campaign 2 he introduced a portable megadungeon that the PCs could enter at any point. They had the option to explore it, knowing it was full of the treasures of a great archmage of the distant past, but gave them other options for how to move forward with their campaign.

If I didn't want to make it optional and instead made it the campaign, I'd work with PCs to give them backstory elements that tie into the megadungeon and give them reasons to investigate it. Then I'd locate it so that PCs have the option so that they can leave it to cleanse their palette - perhaps locating it near a city or a port so that PCs have places to go 'outside'.

I like a condensed megadungeon, so my favorite design's most modern implementation is a nod to some Zelda Games - you have a complex and the heart of a ruined city to explore, but as you explore it you travel back and forth to the Shadowfell, Ethereal, and Feywild variants on it to find information and bypass barriers. The Shadowfell is a Ravenloft Domain that repeats the same day every day - and ends the day with the entire domain collapsing and killing any visitors stuck there (giving the PCs a a time limit on how long they can stay there). The Feywild is an echo of the city at the prime of the city with an Archfey overlord that doesn't want visitors and starts off playing tricks on visitors - but with an escalation to the chaos. The Ethereal is infested with Undead and Aberrations of the Feywild in a horrific reflection of the Prime Version. Once you understand how to navigate the connecting tissue, you can go between any two significant points in about 10 minutes ... but the place constabtly changes and evolves making these journeys quite chaotic. The key here is that the environment becomes a condensed backdrop in which character driven stories can occur.

 

[WarDriveWorley]

PCs need to have a base of operations.

Or at the very least the opportunity and means to create a viable one of their own.

 

[Tyler Do'Urden]

As long as its wheelchair and Centaur accessible and you consider that the so-called "monsters" are there possibly because they were kicked out of their homes and had no where else to go and you may in fact be the invaders.

I don't know about being wheelchair accessible, but the latter part is a valid point - if players want to "clear the dungeon", they can play Diablo or any number of roguelikes and clones. What makes a Megadungeon interesting at the table is that you can interact with it - pursue goals, encounter factions, and generally approach it not as an endless slog of combat, but as a campaign setting in of itself.

I've been running Stonehell in 5E, and it's great this way - the dungeon is full of factions; there are entire "villages" within it, and far from every encounter need to end in a fight.

 

[Lazybones]

As someone noted already in the thread, the Basic module B4: The Lost City is an excellent template for this. It has factions, potentially friendly NPCs, a possible base of operations, and plenty of opportunities for character development considering the fact that the party just essentially stumbles upon the main location by accident. It's more of a frame for a campaign than a complete campaign, but what's provided gives a lot of ideas for expanding out the lower levels and the subterranean city. I've always seen it as sort of a primer for new DMs on how to build out a self-contained campaign from a single location. I haven't read the Goodman Games treatment, but I've updated it to 5e for my own campaign group (haven't run it yet, so I can't report on how well it works in play).

 

[el-remmen]

Can you expand on that? I really don't think the PC-as-superhero, mechanically-anemic exploration pillar playstyle in WotC 5e is compatible with megadungeon play without some adjustments.

All you need is sufficient challenge for the PCs power level, playing up the consequences of diminishing resources of all kinds, use wandering monsters (either randomly or narratively), and players willing to buy in to the narratives that emerge from play.

To be honest, I don't understand the need for specific mechanics for exploration. The PCs explore and uncover things using reason and skills. What else do you need? Exploration has been a big part of some games I've run and I never had specific mechanics for it beyond description and reaction.

 

[the Jester]

My 5e campaign has a gigantic megadungeon in it that various groups have spent a ton of time delving in. It's best to break it up with other types of adventures now and again, but yes, a megedungeon can absolutely work in 5e- if your players are into it.